Economic Recession and its Impact on the Residents Term Paper

Thousands of Wisconsin residents are jobless and they may be staring at the face of a permanent recession

For many years, Austen Frank met his family demands by delivering flowers to his clientele in Madison since the 1970s. “Back then, bouquet shops existed at every corner of the street”, he recalls with relative clarity, as if this happened a few days ago, “Most of them were operated by small-scale investors and did not want to employ their own drivers, so they contracted transport services.”

Frank ran his own transport firm, delivering flowers all over the South Side region. As the size of his clientele increased, he employed two other drivers after purchasing more trucks. “During the holidays, I’d have, like, five drivers working full time.”

The early 80s period saw a boom for the flower business as grocery stores and departmental stores started including flower departments in the stores. “At funerals, we received orders to supply flowers to members of the bereaved families and the small-scale florist was driven out of business as they could not cope with the competition.” Through his business, Frank was able to make a modest living and see two of his four children through high school and eventually through college. Meanwhile, many flower shops emerged and business grew slimmer, he saw an opportunity in the transport industry and opted to open a transport firm, retaining his staff. “The transport sector gave me the much-needed change after being in the flower business for almost 20 years,” he quips.

Frank has been in the transport sector for close to 20 years, but last year, faced with a declining business and high costs of maintaining his staff and trucks, he shut it down. “It’s all due to the recession, I did what I had never thought of doing… at one point, I thought of applying for an overdraft as the company account had run dry,” he says, “but decided against it as no one knew when the recession was going to end”.

He further adds that he has not had a decent sleep since he shut down the transport business; instead, he has been drinking excessively in a bid to forget all his sorrows. “I have been reduced to ashes, my 20 years of hard work has been flushed down the drain,” he laments. As if that was not enough, he had not finished paying his mortgage payments and still had one child to see through college. He awoke every morning still worn out from an avalanche of worries; he had nothing to call his own. His wife laying beside him was not aware of his struggles in paying up the mortgage loan he had taken 10 years ago to expand his business. While she prepares their youngest daughter for school, he goes to town to have a meeting with his bank manager, once again, to negotiate for the extension on his loan. “How long will it be before we get a foreclosure notice?

Most of the neighborhood homes have either been given notices or have been foreclosed.” He adds. A survey of the South Side homes seems to corroborate his story as most of these either have large “FOR SALE” notices on the metallic gates or have been closed. The local council asserts that the overall foreclosure in the South Side is almost twice the national average.

Frank has not come to terms with what confronts him. “Who would have thought that the Lehmann Brothers and General Motors would go bankrupt? Our economy has been shaken right to the core.” He says while staring at nothing in particular in the sky.

Lost for Words

Julie Reilly, another out-of-work single mother, a resident of Milwaukee who used to work as a marketing executive, lacks the words to describe the latest economic downturn. She picks up a line from Charles’ Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Reilly used to work in an upmarket restaurant as a cashier but when recession knocked doors at their outlet, she was among the first employees to be laid off as firms struggled to maintain their staff, amid falling sales.

At 48, she thinks the country is yet to realize the full impacts of the recession. She goes on to mention six of her friends who have been laid off, three of whom have been served with foreclosure notices. “Unless the Obama administration does some magic to revive the economy, we will all end up in the streets.” Her two daughters who had by now joined our conversation seem to agree as they slowly nod their heads. “We cannot even afford to take them for vacation, all the money we get is budgeted for before it reaches our hands,” she adds, referring to her daughters. The family’s only pillar of hope is their eldest son who works at GlaxoSmithKline and has recently been hearing rumors of a looming downsize operation by his employer.

Reilly, just like Frank, thinks there are not enough jobs for all. However, she, too, sees light amid all the job losses and foreclosures. She says “Just like the Great Depression, we’ll get through this recession in a few months’ time.” State officials say that there was a drop in the sales of tax receipts by 4.3 percent between July 2008 and July 2009; the first one in the history of the state. This mirrors the consumer’s worry about the economy, which led to a few purchases during the holidays and extended to the whole of the last fiscal year. The officials say they are looking forward to an increase in the sales tax revenue, roughly $4 billion a year, in the current financial year. However, tax revenues are still on a year-low from those realized in the 2007-2008 financial year and this could create a $2 billion deficit in the state’s annual budget. Lawmakers have already made a $3 billion cut in expenditure and increased taxes on wealthy residents to realize the budget targets.

According to Austen Frank, the recession was caused by the failure of the leaders to read the warnings that had apparently become too open. Rather, these leaders were too preoccupied with their own agenda. “Had the leaders listened to the experts, this whole crisis would not have affected our economy as it has,” says Frank.

Latin Americans and Black most affected

Paula Fernandez, another resident of Orange County, California, describes how the global economic recession has affected Hispanics. “Hispanic workers have been hard hit by the recession due to their misrepresentation in various government and private institutions.” She says, “most of my Hispanic friends have lost their homes and are now considering the prospect of traveling back home”.

Most of the Hispanic population was employed in the construction sector that is one of the industries mostly hit. The gains made by the Latinos have been derailed by the recession. Latinos make up a seventh of the total US labor force but comprise almost 20 percent of the unemployed. Fernandez has had to supplement her little pocket from her parents back in Mexico by applying for student bursaries. “Before the recession, I used to work part-time during the evenings and on the weekends… I even used to send some money to my parents back home, which is no longer possible,” she adds. Paula’s friend, Lisa Lopez, thinks that the groups most hurt by the recession are the African Americans and the Latinos.

The unemployment rates of Latinos have risen from 4.7 to 11 percent ever since the recession began, while that of blacks has risen from 10 percent to 13.5 percent according to an MSNBC report.

Struck like a Thunderbolt

Phil Jones, a 32-year-old African American, lost his job in October 2009 after working for five and his promotion was imminent. He had started off as a casual worker in a bank before being promoted to a clerk and had recently graduated with a degree in Business Administration after seeing himself through university. His five years of hard work were just about to pay off when the recession struck, just like a thunderbolt.

Jones hails President Obama’s $0.6 trillion stimulus package, “in such economic upheaval, the government must spend money”.